UNITED
NATIONS,
April 19 -- The scanned portion of the UN Panel of Experts
report on Sri Lanka war crimes leaked, presumptively by the
government, to The Island newspaper has been obtained by Inner City
Press and is being put online here.

Inner
City Press
spoke both with Silva and with Permanent Representative Palitha
Kohona on the evening of April 19, arriving uninvited at a reception
at Kohona's residence. Despite statements by Secretary General Ban
Ki-moon's spokesmen that the report would be released, Kohona argued
that it should not be made available to the public.

Kohona
emphasized,
as it seems his government did to Ban Ki-moon, that
because April 13 onward was a holiday in Sri Lanka, the UN should not
release the full report. Kohona said that Monday was a lunar holiday,
and the UN could not release the report -- giving a new meaning to
Ban Ki-MOON.

Those
days were used to leak portions of the report to
The Island newspaper, with President Mahinda Rajapaksa calling for
mass protests against the UN report on May 1.

At
Kohona's
reception, the Permanent Representative of Egypt -- Maged Abdelaziz,
the same one as under Hosni Mubarak -- arrived and chatted with Silva
and Kohona, Egypt, as head of the Non Aligned Movement, pressured Ban
Ki-moon against any real investigation of war crimes in Sri Lanka.

Abdelaziz left early, as did Inner City Press. Silva said he had two
other events to attend -- part of a campaign about and against the
Panel of Experts report. We'll have more on this.

* * *

On
Sri
Lanka, UN Gave 196 Pages to Silva, Asked 24 Then 36 Hours,
Got Played

The
report, they
say, is 196 pages long. On April 11, Inner City Press learned that it
would be handed to Ban Ki-moon on April 12. After it was, it was also
provided -- on hard copy only -- to Sri Lanka's Deputy Permanent
Representative, General Shavendra Silva, who is himself implicated in
war crimes in the final stages of the conflict.

The
UN told
Shavendra Silva that Ban would be releasing the report in 24 hours,
sources tell Inner City Press. Silva responded that the Sri Lankan
government wanted or needed “a little more time.” The UN replied
that it would give 36 hours, tops.

But
the 36 hours
came and went. And by then a scan of the hard copy had been provided
to The Island, a newspapers with agrees with President Mahinda
Rajapaksa. The Island ran it, with typos as identified by Inner City
Press.

Inexplicable
to
many, Ban and the UN Secretariat even then did not release the
report. They held it over the weekend, and did not release it either
Monday or Tuesday. They have, many say, undermined the report.

The
Experts, too,
have done their part. Their report as excerpted says that all
international staff left an area, then has international staff
witnessing the shelling of a medical facility. This will be fodder
for the government's response. But the government of Rajapaksa has
already responded, with a call for mass protests against the UN
report on May 1.

Why
did Ban do
this? Why did he never call for a ceasefire? Why did he send Nambiar
as his envoy, and still allow him to be involved after his role in
the so-called white flag killings of surrenderees? What will Ban
discuss with Russia on his upcoming visit? How might this all be used
to assure a second term as Secretary General? Watch this site.

Footnote:
beyond
misleading about the meeting of Attorney General Mohan Peiris
with Ban's now invisible panel, it's reported that during that secret
session, the UN agreed to give Sri Lanka some extra weeks before the
filing of the report. It was extended to April 12, the day before the
New Year in Sri Lanka, when all of the above then happened. One
couldn't have done more to undermine a war crimes report.

UNITED
NATIONS,
April 19 -- Sri Lanka and the UN Panel of Experts' report
were listed in advance as topics of the Security Council briefing on
the afternoon of April 18 by UN Department of Political Affairs chief
Lynn Pascoe. Click here for
that exclusive Inner City Press report.

The issues had been so listed even before the leak,
presumptively by the government of Mahinda Rajapaksa, of a summary of
the report to The Island newspaper.

But
after the
leak, that was the main topic inside the Council, multiple sources
told Inner City Press afterwards. It was said, inside the Council,
that the government was the likely leaker. But a range of Council
members said it made no sense to have a discussion of a partial leak
rather than the whole report.

Just
as Russia
opposed any Council discussion of Sri Lanka during the final, bloody
stages of the conflict in 2009, on April 18, 2011 in the Council
Russia raised a number of “procedural” objections, sources told
Inner City Press afterward.

It
should be noted
that in the cases of Ivory Coast, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon
took action, even military action, over Russian objections. Now, Ban
is on his way to Russia, seemingly to try to smooth that over and
seek to protect his chances at a second term as Secretary General,
which Russia could veto.

Will
meaningful
action on the UN Panel of Experts report on Sri Lanka be sacrificed
to Ban's drive for a second term? Watch this site.

Even
as
leaked,
the report says that

“During
the
final stages of the war, the United Nations political organs and
bodies failed to take actions that might have protected civilians.
Moreover, although senior international officials advocated in public
and in private with the Government that it protect civilians and stop
the shelling of hospitals and United Nations or ICRC locations, in
the Panel’s view, the public use of casualty figures would have
strengthened the call for the protection of civilians while those
events in the Vanni were unfolding....

“Considering
the
response of the United Nations to the plight of civilians in the
Vanni during the final stages of the war in Sri Lanka and the
aftermath.. The Secretary-General should conduct a comprehensive
review of actions by the United Nations system during the war in Sri
Lanka and the aftermath, regarding the implementation of its
humanitarian and protection mandates.”

But
how is this
Secretary General, with a chief of staff whose role in the so called
white flag killings in Sri Lanka, and who withheld his own Office for
the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs casualty figures which were
subsequently leaked to and published by Inner City Press, to credibly
“conduct of comprehensive review” of his own behavior, and that
of his senior advisers?